Nelson v. State
Nelson v. State
Opinion of the Court
Opinion
The plaintiff, Robert W. Nelson, appeals from the decision of the workers’ compensation review
The issue is whether the plaintiff received a work-related injury under circumstances that the legislature intended would be compensable pursuant to § 5-142 (a), while in the actual performance of his job duties.
The plaintiff was a marshal at the Superior Court in Danbury, employed by judicial branch at the time of his injury on August 15, 2002. The plaintiff had been requested to go to the cell block in the courthouse to get two prisoners in order to bring them to the courtroom. He called the name of one of the prisoners but got no response. He looked into that prisoner’s cell and saw the prisoner standing up, shaking and wobbly on his feet. The plaintiff “looked down and there was a huge puddle of blood on the floor.” He then saw the prisoner fall to the floor, thereby partially blocking the door to the cell. The prisoner’s body was wedged in such a way that if the door was pushed “anywhere from six inches to a foot it probably would end up snapping his neck.” The plaintiff called for medical assistance and squeezed into the cell to “either render first aid or find out what was going on.” The plaintiff did not know that the prisoner had slit his wrist until looking over his body. The plaintiff testified that he “found out after
In response to a question on cross-examination as to whether the prisoner could have been a threat, the plaintiff answered: “You know, at the time, maybe, I mean, he could have, if, maybe, he was faking [that] he was unconscious and then came at me. I don’t know. That’s why it was such a quick reaction to pull him away from the door and get another officer in and then render first aid, which we found out that he slit his wrists.”
The plaintiff testified that even though the prisoner was unconscious after he entered the cell, the prisoner remained a threat because “anyone committing suicide is a dangerous person to you or me” and that the inmate “is a prisoner, first of all, and you are dealing with what I had to deal with [which] was the blood exposure.” The plaintiff injured his back in moving the prisoner’s body further away from the door in order to facilitate the medical personnel’s entry into the cell. The plaintiff used paper towels to staunch the blood and to apply pressure to the wounds. The plaintiff testified that his hands were “slipping from blood” and that the incident was “not at all a normal occurrence.” Both of the plaintiffs arms were exposed to blood, and he required “some blood work” because of that exposure.
The precise question of the statutory interpretation of “special hazards inherent” as applied to the facts of this case has not yet been decided, although the phrase has been interpreted in the context of other facts. See Johnson v. State, 67 Conn. App. 330, 786 A.2d 1260 (2001), cert. granted, 259 Conn. 924, 792 A.2d 854 (2002) (appeal withdrawn March 28, 2002). This case, therefore, is not the usual one of a prior interpretation of statutory words by the board or an appellate court, to which we would accord deference. See Tracy v. Scherwitzky Gutter Co., 279 Conn. 265, 272, 901 A.2d 1176 (2006). The interpretation adopted by the commissioner and the board as applied to these facts has not precisely been subjected to judicial review, causing us to exercise plenary review. See Ricigliano v. Ideal Forging Corp., 280 Conn. 723, 728-29, 912 A.2d 462 (2006).
The interpretation of a statute is a question of law. See, e.g., Tracy v. Scherwitzky, Gutter Co., supra, 279 Conn. 273. We recognize, however, that the legislature, by creating the workers’ compensation commission and the board, has entrusted to them the primary responsibility of determining workers’ compensation claims. Further, we recognize that the board usually has had
“[T]o be eligible for benefits under § 5-142 (a), the state employee must (1) be a member of a specified group of state employees, (2) be engaged in the performance of a specified duty, and (3) the injury sustained must be as a result of special hazards inherent in such duties. (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Stuart v. Dept. of Correction, 221 Conn. 41, 42 n.1, 601 A.2d 539 (1992). The covered group of employees includes “any Judicial Department employee . . . .” General Statutes § 5-142 (a). To be covered, the employee must be engaged in “making an arrest or in the actual performance of . . . guard duties ... or while attending or restraining an inmate . . . or as a result of being assaulted in the performance of his duty . . . . ” (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Stuart v. Dept. of Correction, supra, 44. The plaintiff has the burden to prove that he has satisfied the statutory requirements. See Bidoae v. Hartford Golf Club, 91 Conn. App. 470, 483, 881 A.2d 418, cert. denied, 276 Conn. 921, 888 A.2d 87 (2005), cert. denied, U.S. , 126 S. Ct. 1916, 164 L. Ed. 2d 665 (2006); see also Johnson v. State, supra, 67 Conn. App. 335 n.4.
There is no dispute that the plaintiff satisfies the first requirement of § 5-142 (a), namely, that he is among the class of protected workers. There was some dispute
The primary issue in this case is whether the plaintiff produced sufficient evidence to show that his injury was the “direct result of the special hazards”; General Statutes § 5-142 (a); in his employment. The term “special hazards” is not defined in the statute itself. Further, although the term occasionally arises in various unrelated contexts in our case law; see, e.g., Kuharski v. Bristol Brass Corp., 132 Conn. 563, 565, 46 A.2d 11 (1946); there is also no common-law definition of the term. To interpret the term’s statutory meaning, we begin with the statutory language itself. Lucarelli v. State, 16 Conn. App. 65, 68-69, 546 A.2d 940 (1988). The statute provides that if a covered employee is engaged in a covered activity and “sustains any injury . . . that is a direct result of the special hazards inherent in such duties” the statute is satisfied. General Statutes § 5-142 (a). We examined the overall intent of a previous version of the statute in Lucarelli v. State, supra, 69-70. There we noted that “[t]he classifications of state employees enumerated in the provision share a common characteristic: these employees, in the daily course of performing their duties, work in an atmosphere sometimes charged with emotion and stress, and face the possibility of confrontations with inmates, patients or arrestees, which confrontations often result in violence.” Id., 69. The general intent of the statute, we found, was to recognize the heightened dangers certain employees face. Id.
The history of the statute has been reviewed elsewhere and need not be recited in detail here. See Jones v. Mansfield Training School, 220 Conn. 721, 725, 601 A.2d 507 (1992). “The legislature, in its various reenactments . . . has steadfastly manifested its intention to make these benefits a generous source of compensation for its beneficiaries.” Id. The statute was amended in 1991 by the legislature in reaction to a consequence of the original statute discussed by this court in Lucare-lli. See Johnson v. State, supra, 67 Conn. App. 336 n.6. In Lucarelli, the plaintiff, while on guard duty, sat on a chair to fill out paperwork and was injured when the chair collapsed. Lucarelli v. State, supra, 16 Conn. App. 67. The Lucarelli court noted that the statute, as it stood at the time, required only that the covered employee be engaged in a covered activity, which, in that case, was the act of guarding. Id., 69-70. Because the plaintiff was on guard duty, he satisfied the statute. Id., 70. The court specifically noted that if “the legislature had wished to limit the special benefits of § 5-142 to only those situations fraught with hazard, it easily could have done so. The absence of the terms ‘hazardous’ or ‘special’ in the statute indicates that the legislature meant to omit them.” Id. The legislature subsequently added both terms. See Johnson v. State, supra, 336 n.6.
This court has examined the “special hazards” requirement once previously, in Johnson v. State, supra, 67 Conn. App. 336. In Johnson, we affirmed the board’s decision reversing the commissioner’s conclusion that the plaintiff had not satisfied the requirements of § 5-142 (a). In that case, an inmate slipped and fell while
The Johnson court agreed with the board that “almost any employee in any business might be placed in the unexpected situation of having to break someone’s fall . . . .” (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Johnson v. State, supra, 67 Conn. App. 337. The court held that the board properly overruled the commissioner because there was no competent evidence that catching hold of people who slip is an especially hazardous aspect of a prison guard’s job. Id. The board and this court found it significant that no attack on the plaintiff had occurred and that the “[plaintiff] did not mistakenly believe that he was in immediate danger.” In the present case, although there was no attack on the plaintiff, the plaintiff believed that there was athreat of immediate danger.
In addition to the interpretation of “special hazards” as discussed in Johnson, we also review the relevant authority found in the other decisions of the board, which were not subjected to judicial review. The board first addressed the provision in Gray v. State, 12 Conn. Workers’ Comp. Rev. Op. 279 (1994). In that case, a patient who, because of her mental health condition, “lack[ed] the gross motor skills of a woman of her age,” began to fall. Id., 280. The plaintiff in that case attempted to break the patient’s fall by lifting the patient. Id. The
The board next addressed “special hazards” in Bouchard v. Dept. of Mental Health & Addiction Services, 04120-CRB-08-99-09 (July 28, 2000). In Bouchard, the plaintiff, a supervisor at the Whiting Forensic Division of Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown, injured his foot while playing volleyball with inmates. Id. The board denied the plaintiffs request for benefits on the ground that he did not provide sufficient facts demonstrating that his playing volleyball with inmates was any more dangerous than playing in a typical volleyball game with members of the general public. Id. The board noted that “the fact that the hospital setting as a whole was potentially dangerous did not legally transform each act of ‘attending’ [the inmates] into an inherently hazardous activity .... [T]he presence of potentially belligerent inmates on the court may have represented a latent threat, but the ¡plaintiff] had to demonstrate that this threat was realized in some manner in order to qualify for § 5-142 (a) benefits.” (Emphasis added.) Id. As in the board’s decision in Johnson, the two factors considered important, namely, the lack of an attack and the lack of a subjective rational perception that there might be an attack were cited as the rationale for the denial of § 5-142 (a) benefits.
Finally, in Hudson v. Dept. of Correction, 4582 CRB-3-02-11 (October 31, 2003), the board upheld the award
In the present case, the commissioner concluded, and the board affirmed, that the injury did not arise from a special hazard inherent in the plaintiffs job. The commissioner reasoned that the danger the plaintiff faced was similar to the danger any member of the public might face when encountering a fallen individual, whether the cause of the need for assistance was a slip on ice, a fainting episode or a motor vehicle accident. The plaintiff had the burden to show that moving the inmate presented a heightened danger different from the danger inherent in his usual job of escorting a prisoner to a courtroom, and different from the dangers encountered in other situations that might be faced by any member of the public, and rationally perceived by him to present a danger.
On the basis of decisional precedent, a special hazard inherent in the job, for the purpose of satisfying § 5-142 (a), is a heightened danger or peril that sometimes arises in performing the enumerated jobs, other than the general hazard always present in those jobs, or present in events involving the general populace. In order to distinguish general hazards as opposed to special hazards, our court and the board have characterized the hazards present in all employments or activities as not coming within the statute. See Johnson v. State, supra, 67 Conn. App. 330; Bouchard v. Dept. of Mental Health & Addiction Services, supra, 04120-CRB-08-99-09.
In his job as a marshal, the plaintiff, whose duty it was to escort the prisoner to a courtroom, was performing that duty when he was confronted with a unique or special situation not usually encountered in that job, a situation that could not be immediately diffused without further investigation. We conclude that he was
The decision of the workers’ compensation review board is reversed and the case is remanded to the board with direction to remand the case to the workers’ compensation commission with direction to award benefits consistent with this opinion.
In this opinion FLYNN, C. J., concurred.
General Statutes § 5-142 (a) provides in relevant part: “If any . . . Judicial Department employee sustains any ir\jury (1) . . . while attending or restraining an inmate . . . and (2) that is a direct result of the special hazards inherent in such duties, the state shall pay all necessary medical and hospital expenses resulting from such injury. If total incapacity results from such injury, such person shall be removed from the active payroll the first day of incapacity, exclusive of the day of injury, and placed on an inactive payroll. Such person shall continue to receive the full salary that such person was receiving at the time of injury subject to all salary benefits of active employees, including annual increments, and all salary adjustments, including salary deductions, required in the case of active employees, for a period of two hundred sixty weeks from the date of the beginning of such incapacity. . . .”
The interpretation of the words of General Statutes § 5-142 (a), “special hazards inherent in [his] duties,” is intertwined with, and dependent on the facts properly found by the commissioner, properly relied on by the board or which were undisputed relevant facts presented to the commissioner. Contrary to the argument of the plaintiff, the board’s statement that “the [plaintiff] was not preventing or stopping the suicide, nor was he restraining the prisoner” was not an improper finding of a fact not found by the commissioner but the board’s attempt to summarize evidence. See Johnson v. State, 67 Conn. App. 330, 786 A.2d 1260 (2001), cert. granted, 259 Conn. 924, 792 A.2d 854 (2002) (appeal withdrawn March 28, 2002).
A transcript of the testimony was available to this court. None of the testimony of the plaintiff was disputed by the commissioner.
There is no indication in the record as to the crime with which the prisoner was charged.
The claim of total disability does not involve any adverse consequences arising from the contact with the prisoner’s blood.
The prisoner’s attempt to commit suicide was thwarted because he did not die as a result of his act.
No deference is given to a board’s decision, however, if its interpretation of a statute, on the basis of similar facts, is contrary to a prior interpretation of a previous board decision or to an interpretation of the same statutory provision by an appellate court. See Ricigliano v. Ideal Forging Corp., supra, 280 Conn. 728-29.
Concurring Opinion
concurring. I agree that the decision of the workers’ compensation review board (board) should be reversed but write separately because I conclude that injuries that are a direct of result of suicide rescue are a special hazard inherent in a judicial marshal’s duties.
In this appeal, the plaintiff, Robert W. Nelson, is seeking workers’ compensation benefits pursuant to General Statutes § 5-142 (a), which provides in relevant part: “If . . . any Judicial Department employee sustains any injury (1) . . . in the actual performance of such . . . guard duties ... or while attending or restraining an inmate . . . or as a result of being assaulted in the performance of such person’s duty, or while responding to an emergency ... at a correctional institution, and (2) that is a direct result of the special hazards inherent in such duties, the state shall pay all necessary medical and hospital expenses .... If total incapacity results from such injury . . . [s]uch person shall continue to receive the full salary that such person was receiving at the time of injury . . . .” (Emphasis added.)
The findings of the workers’ compensation commissioner (commissioner) are for the most part consistent
I agree with the majority that the resolution of the plaintiffs appeal involves statutory construction, which is a question of law. “The principles that govern our
The factual circumstances of this case, in which a judicial mar shal came upon a passive prisoner in need of immediate medical attention, have not been addressed by the board. The board, in fact, conceded that Johnson v. State, 67 Conn. App. 330, 786 A.2d 1260 (2001), cert. granted, 259 Conn. 924, 792 A.2d 854 (2002) (appeal withdrawn March 28, 2002),
In this case, the parties agree that the plaintiff sustained a compensable injury, and the defendant has paid all of the plaintiffs medical expenses, including those for blood tests necessitated by the plaintiffs exposure to the prisoner’s blood. The plaintiff, however, was totally incapacitated for three weeks due to an injury to his back that he sustained when he moved the prisoner. The issue, as stated by the commissioner, is “whether [the plaintiff] is entitled to a compensation rate of roughly two-thirds of his pay [under chapter 568 of the General Statutes] or 100 percent of his pay [pursuant to § 5-142 (a)].” To resolve the issue, this court must answer the question whether an injury sustained by a judicial marshal while he attends a prisoner who has attempted suicide is a direct result of the special hazards of such duty. I answer this question in the affirmative, concluding that because attempted suicide is an emergency that occurs in jails more frequently than it does in the general population, injuries that are a direct result of suicide rescue are a special hazard inherent in the duties of a judicial marshal.
“Relevant legislation and precedent guide the process of statutory interpretation. [General Statutes § l-2z]
In a 1958 opinion issued by the attorney general, the stated purpose of the predecessor to § 5-142 (a) was “to give extra compensation than that provided by the provisions of the [Workers’] Compensation Act to those employees whose duties relating to the attending or restraining of inmates, and the danger of being assaulted, are more hazardous than other State employees.” Opinions, Conn. Atty. Gen. No. 30-115 (January 28,1958). The attorney general’s opinion helps to make clear that an assault or physical aggression toward a
Although decisions of this court and our Supreme Court recognize that the duties of certain state employees subject them to assault; see, e.g., Jones v. Mansfield Training School, 220 Conn. 721, 724, 601 A.2d 507 (1992) (employee injured when attacked by resident of training school); under the statute, physical violence or aggression is not the only danger for which compensation is available. The present form of the statute also contemplates that a judicial marshal may be required to respond to an emergency. The statute now provides that certain state employees who interact with prisoners may be subject to injury by means other than physical violence. By the clear language of the statute, therefore, benefits are available under § 5-142 (a) not only for an injury sustained by a marshal who was restraining a prisoner or who was assaulted by one, but also for injury sustained while the judicial marshal was “responding to an emergency . . . .” General Statutes § 5-142 (a). In this case, a judicial marshal was exposed not only to the prisoner’s blood and the possible risk of contracting a deadly disease, but also to an injury to his back caused by having to move the prisoner in order for emergency medical treatment to be provided.
Suicide, or attempted suicide, is not uncommon in prisons and jails. Trial courts routinely place prisoners who are accused of crimes on suicide watch. Counsel for the parties here debated prisoner suicides before the commissioner, who acknowledged at the hearing
I also disagree with the manner in which the board distinguished the facts here from Hudson, to wit: the plaintiff in this case “was moving the inmate after the suicide attempt. The [plaintiff] was not preventing or stopping the suicide, nor was he restraining the prisoner.” In Hudson, the prison guard came upon the inmate as he was dangling in a noose and sustained a back injury by lifting the inmate to prevent strangulation. In this case, the plaintiff came upon the prisoner immediately after he had collapsed on the floor and was bleeding profusely. Although the plaintiff did not prevent the suicide attempt in the sense that he kept the prisoner from slitting his wrists, he may have prevented the prisoner’s death by moving the prisoner so that he and others could administer first aid. I believe that a suicide attempt is not over until the victim either
Because I conclude that injuries directly related to suicide rescue are a special hazard inherent in a judicial marshal’s duties, I concur.
The commissioner found that the plaintiff discovered the pool of blood on the floor after opening the cell door. The evidence presented at the hearing indicated that the plaintiff saw the blood on the floor while looking through the window of the cell.
In Johnson v. State, supra, 67 Conn. App. 330, this court upheld the decision of the board, concluding that reaching for an inmate who slips as he exits a shower is not a special hazard inherent in a prison guard’s duties. Id., 337. The board observed that “almost any employee in any business might be placed in the unexpected situation of having to break someone’s fall . . . .” (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Id. As I conclude herein, rescuing a person from attempted suicide is not a position in which almost any employee in any business might be found. In coming to this conclusion, I do not imply that any person coming upon an individual who has attempted suicide, whether in the workplace or not, would not call for medical assistance.
The commissioner awarded compensation under § 5-142 (a) for an iryury that resulted from an attempted suicide in Hudson v. Dept. of Correction, supra, 4582 CRB-3-02-11. The board affirmed the commissioner’s finding because it concluded that the correction officer was injured while restraining a resistant inmate who was attempting to hang himself. In affirming the award, the board acknowledged the increased risk of suicide in a prison setting. “[T]he act of restraining an inmate so as to prevent his suicide falls within the ambit of special hazards of employment as a correction officer. Also, the prison setting is much more likely to produce a situation such as the one in the instant matter than other employment situations as contemplated by [Johnson v. State, supra, 67 Conn. App. 330].” Hudson v. Dept. of Correction, supra, 4582 CRB-3-02-11.
The following colloquy occurred during the hearing.
“[The Plaintiffs Counsel]: . . . Johnson, the earlier case, is where an inmate trips and falls and they say, hey, that can happen anywhere. They indicate, we think, [that] there is a difference between these two activities, that is the Johnson [plaintiff] falling accidentally and that of restraining an inmate to prevent a suicide .... Prevent the suicide falls in the special hazards of employment as a correction officer.
“The Commissioner: Well, we just want to illuminate a bit about these cases, and a suicide situation is probably not unique because people do that more than just in jails, but what it would seem to me, it could be considered a special hazard and, therefore, things would befall a particular inmate or one of the employees. I could see how that in effect is a special hazard. I don’t think it is unique, but it is special.
“[The Plaintiffs Counsel]: And that — not that, I think not that it could only happen there, but that it is more — the chances are more likely that it is going to happen there.
“The Commissioner: That is what I think we understand when we talk about a special hazard in this context; that it is something that will happen here far more readily than anywhere else.”
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